Ernesto Bertarelli

Ernesto Bertarelli first met singer and former Miss UK pageant winner Kirsty Roper at a dinner party on his yacht off the coast of Sardinia in 1997. The couple got married in 2000 and has three children together: Chiara, Falco and Alceo.

He lives with his family in their estate in Gstaad, and also spends time in their house on the shores of Lake Geneva. On her 40th birthday, he gifted his wife Vava II, a 314-foot, £100 million yacht.

His mother has played a significant role in making Serono a global leader, supporting both her husband and her children. She currently lives in Gstaad, Switzerland, but also spends time in Italy where, together with her brother Claudio, she runs the Colle Massari vineyard.

Ernesto Bertarelli was born on September 22, 1965 in Rome, Italy to Fabio Bertarelli and Maria Iris. He is the eldest child of his parents, and has a sister named Dona.

His grandfather, Pietro Bertarelli, was with Serono since it was established back in 1906 in Italy and became its Managing Director in 1935. The pharmaceutical company rose to prosperity with its groundbreaking breakthroughs in infertility treatments in the 1960s.

His father, Fabio, became the Chief Executive of Serono in 1965 and bought out significant stake of the company from the Vatican in the mid-1970s. However, due to threats from leftwing Red Brigades militants, he shifted the family, as well as the business, from Rome to Geneva.

A young Ernesto discovered his love for sailing after relocating near Geneva Lake. His new hobby would eventually become his passion, as he would take part in yacht competitions in the future.

He learned tools of the trade from his father, accompanying him on business trips since the age of 10. By the time he was 17, he even helped in preparing the company’s annual budgets.

Ernesto Bertarelli started his career with Serono in 1985, holding several positions in the sales and marketing departments of the company. He served as the deputy CEO for five years before succeeding his father as the CEO of Serono in 1996.

After his father’s death in 1998, he inherited ownership of the company alongside his sister Dona. He shifted focus of the company from pharmaceuticals to biotechnology, and by 2006, took the company's revenue from $809 million to $2.8 billion.

In 2000, he oversaw the listing of the company’s shares on the New York Stock Exchange. Serono was sold to Merck KGaA of Germany in early 2007 for $13.3bn, following which it became Merck-Serono. Both Ernesto and his sister got an estimated $4.5bn from the deal.

He served as a member of the board of directors of UBS AG, a Swiss global financial services company, from 2002 to 2009. Prior to that, he had been the Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors since 1991.

He is the chairman of the Waypoint Capital group, which focuses primarily on healthcare-focused investment fund through Gurnet Point Capital and asset management via Kedge Capital Group. While it is headquartered in Geneva, Waypoint has offices in London, Jersey, Boston and Luxembourg.

In 1998, Ernesto Bertarelli, along with his family, established the Bertarelli Foundation in memory of his father Fabio. It aims to bring in real change in the fields of marine conservation and life science research.

In 2010, the Bertarelli Foundation provided funding for the Chagos Island Marine Reserve in the Indian Ocean, which is the largest marine reserve in the world. It had a big impact in doubling the area of marine conservation from 0.5 percent to 1 percent.

In 2012, the Bertarelli Foundation established a reserve around Belize's Turneffe Atoll. It is the world’s second-largest coral reef and is considered the world's most bio-diverse ecosystem with more than 500 species of fish thriving.